Mary Ann & Bill's Excellent Adventure
Travel in Retirement
Yesterday afternoon we spent a few hours at Mesa Verde National Park. The purpose of this park is to preserve archeological sites of ancient Pueblo people. In this park you can learn about Pueblo culture and visit ancient cliff dwellings. We hiked down to what is called the Spruce Tree House.
There is a lot more to see at Mesa Verde and we will be going back later in the week.
Yesterday we visited Arches National Park.
Sand Dune Arch sits on a floor of fine pink sand. There were children building sand castles during our visit.
Landscape Arch is the largest in Arches National Park. In 1991 a huge slab fell out of the arch but the arch has stayed connected. I heard that people were allowed to walk under the arch before that but fences are in place now to prevent it.
The Windows section of the park has several well known arches. We can also see these from our campground a few miles away.
Delicate Arch is the most well know arch. We did not take the long hike to walk around the base of the arch. I liked Landscape Arch better.
There were some other interesting sights that are not arches.
Today we visited Canyonlands. It was not nearly as impressive as arches but we saw some interesting and beautiful sites. The Green River and the Colorado River both run through the Park. The rivers have carved impressive canyons over the ages.
Today we drove from Arizona up to Moab, UT which is near Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. On the way we drove through Monument Valley and other scenic places on the Colorado Plateau (please excuse the spots on the windshield).
We are staying in ArchView Campground in Moab. We can see Arches National Park in the distance from our campsite.
Tomorrow we go see Arches up close, and Canyonlands the following day (I’m retired and I cannot remember what day of the week it is 🙂 ).
We have stopped for a couple of nights at Fort Beale RV Park in Kingman, AZ. We left the Grand Canyon yesterday because we had seen just about everything we wanted to and the weather was getting colder and windier – not much fun outside. Since we already have reservations in Southern AZ starting tomorrow we decided to take off early and visit another Route 66 town.
We visited two history museums, The Route 66 History Museum and the Mohave Museum of History and Arts.
We drove east about 30 miles on route 66 and visited Hackberry General Store. It’s a crazy place that was may have once been a gas station and general store but is now more of ad-hoc collection of old route 66 memorabilia.
Monday we visited the Grand Canyon Village Historic District. As early as 1901 tourists started visiting the grand canyon, arriving on the Grand Canyon Railway from Williams, AZ. During the following decade Grand Canyon Village expanded around the railway Station. We had fun exploring the historical buildings. Many of the buildings were designed by Mary Colter.
Yesterday and today we explored the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. Yesterday we travelled west on the free shuttle buses as far as Hermit’s Rest. Today we travelled east by car as far as Desert View. We stopped at every site along the way in both directions. We did walk a bit but it is very difficult in the high elevation. We had sunny weather both days but today is a bit windy.
It’s ridiculous how many photos I took, it was hard to narrow it down to a manageable quantity for the blog. But the views are so spectacular.
We saw some better views of the Colorado River today.
My new favorite historical person is Mary Colter. She was an architect in the early 1900s and designed a number of structures in Grand Canyon. Some are shown below and others I plan to visit during the rest of our stay.
We stopped at the Tusayan Ruins, the remains of an 800 year old Pueblo Indian Village.
And the elk are still visiting frequently.
We woke up this morning to 15 degrees (brrr!!). The water pump had frozen up so we had no running water while we got ready to leave. But no permanent damage. We brushed our teeth and flushed with drinking water 🙂
Left Bryce Canyon and drove to Grand Canyon. On the way we drove through Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.
Part of our trip was on route 89. A section of route 89 in Arizona was closed in 2013 due to a landslide. It has been repaired and just re-opened recently. Don’t know if this is the location of the landslide that closed the road but certainly would not have liked being in the vicinity if rocks started sliding.
Arrived in Grand Canyon Park early afternoon.
Staying in Trailer Village Campground.
Walked over to the South Rim (a short walk from the campground) and got our first good look at the canyon.
A herd of elk roams around the campground regularly. We are finally getting to see some wildlife!
We arrived in Bryce Canyon City yesterday.
We are staying at a campground just outside the park named Ruby’s Inn RV Park. It is part of a large complex (hotel, store, campground) that started as a small inn in the early 1900s where visitors came to see Bryce Canyon. The inn was established by Rueben (aka Ruby) and Minnie Syrett who grew up in the area. There are not many other campers here.
Today we visited Bryce Canyon National Park. The park is smaller than many others, located on a high plateau (note the elevations on the signs below) , and has spectacular views.
We learned a new word a few months ago. The rock formations in formed by erosion in many locations in the southwest are called ‘hoodoos’. There are loads of beautiful hoodoos in Bryce Canyon.
There were some warning signs posted.
We saw an area where a forest fire had occurred a few years ago. It does not seem that much a grown back yet.
And we got a taste of the cold and snow we missed in Massachusetts this winter. It was in the 30s all day and there was plenty of snow and wind. Luckily the sun was warm and we did not need to shovel any snow.
